I often think about the opening words of Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of ti...mes." I know Dickens wasn't talking about one- to three- year-olds, but his words do capture the extremes of emotion that toddlers and their parents experience every day. Can there be a creature on earth as adorable--and as trying--as a toddler?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The most important emotional accomplishment of the toddler years is reconciling the urge to become competent and self-reliant with... the longing for parental love and protection.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Acknowledging separation feelings directly and sympathetically is the best way of coping with them. It is actually helpful to tell... a toddler "I'll miss you," or "I will think of you during the day," or "It is hard to say goodbye," or "I can't wait to see you at the end of the day." These messages tell the child that he is important to the parent even when they are not together and that out of sight need not mean out of mind.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Routine physical punishment such as spanking teaches a toddler that might makes right and that it is fine to hit when one is stron...ger and can get away with it.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
When a toddler uses profanity, don't make a big deal about it. If you do, you give the child more power. After all, it's only a wo...rd--one that won't do much harm to anybody. In fact, if you think about it, a nasty word is a step up from hitting or biting someone. So look at it as a sign of growth.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Self-centeredness is a natural outgrowth of one of the toddler's major concerns: What is me and what is mine...? This is why most ...toddlers are incapable of sharing ... to a toddler, what's his is what he can get his hands on.... When something is taken away from him, he feels as though a piece of him--an integral piece--is being torn from him.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Once we begin to appreciate that the apparent destructiveness of the toddler in taking apart a flower or knocking down sand castle...s is in fact a constructive effort to understand unity, we are able to revise our view of the situation, moving from reprimand and prohibition to the intelligent channeling of his efforts and the fostering of discovery.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
As Anna Freud remarked, the toddler who wanders off into some other aisle, feels lost, and screams anxiously for his mother never ...says "I got lost," but accusingly says "You lost me!" It is a rare mother who agrees that she lost him! she expects her child to stay with her; in her experience it is the child who has lost track of the mother, while in the child's experience it is the mother who has lost track of him. Each view is entirely correct from the perspective of the individual who holds it .LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »